I know regeneration is a major event in the Doctor's life, but RTD made it seem like death, when in fact it's just a new body along with a minor personality change.

The "I don't wanna go" line suggested that the Doctor was about to change more fundamentally than he really was.

Eccleston into Tennant and Smith into Capaldi were both done far better.

Discuss

Here we go.....

"Here we go again..." would have been more appropriate, given the regeneration theme!

I like the doctor to act to as all the different incarnations past and future are all him and one solitary man (because they are), so I do take issue with the cafe scene with wilf where he says "it feels like dying" and "a new man goes sauntering away" because those lines just seem wrong and the very fact he remembers those experiences from before kind of disproves what he is saying there and proves that he is the same man he's always been.

As for the actual regeneration itself though, I have to disagree with you. It is a grand, beautifully done few minutes, and the "I don't wanna go" line is just that he has become so attached to this particular body and it's quirks, probably more so than any of his others and feels so comfortable in his current skin that he really dosen't want to have to change it.

A fitting send off for a doctor who was so popular with the audience, and I suspect that another aspect of the "I dont wanna go" line was rusell subtly echoing the sentiment he knew many fans would be feeling that they didn't want him to go either. When I heard him say the line I certainly could only think "I dont want you to go either"

I hated it. Worst regeneration ever.

This is very much my own view point on it as well.

If this regeneration had been the first in the New Series, I may have accepted it a little bit more about The Doctor kicking off over his forthcoming Regeneration. I could have accepted it under the New Who, New Rules thing. But the thing is, it wasn't the first. The Ninth Doctor had accepted his fate like all the other guys before him. So it puzzled me why suddenly after all these regenerations he was making a fuss about it. Just didn't seem right.

However, aside the pointless twenty minutes that preceded it, I thought the regeneration itself was fitting for that particular Doctor and certainly 100 times better than the one that followed it imo.

The worst regeneration ever was in fact Smith to Capaldi, as all we got was Smith tilting his head back, then he leant forward again to reveal Capaldi.

The second worst is when Sylvester had to put on a blonde wig, and pretend to be Colin Baker. I could tell it was Sylvester, even when the computerised blob over his face swirled and gradually dissapeared to reveal the Seventh Doctor properly.

Completely agree with the OP. With the exception of Sixth Doctor's regeneration, this was the worst.

The Eleventh Doctor's regeneration, on the other hand, was a masterpiece.

Um....I've not seen End of Time for a fair while because it didn't float my boat really, but watching at the time, once we finally got to the regeneration itself, I thought it was well done, but understand why the last line of Ten is contentious. Personally, it didn't feel right. Still....makes me smile when I remember the look of surprise on Eleven's face when he stops screaming.

(Know a number of people didn't like it, but thought Eleven to Twelve was very effective.)

Edit: I do think the "other man saunters away" stuff was seriously misjudged, though.

The other man saunders away stuff ruib 10 to 11 for me. The whole new man thing isn't really in keeping with The Doctor.

As for 11 to 12, I wish they stuck to the Bell Tower. Anything afterwards took away for me and.... forgive me... I didn't like the Amelia / Amy callback either.

Still 11 to 12 was better than 10 to 11.

I liked it. Its extremely sentimental and somewhat angsty, but it looked cool, and it felt earned.

I feel the need to make a strong posting here in support or maybe against the OP because Im pretty sure its never been discussed before

I think it's better to treat regeneration as a serious, awful thing otherwise The Doctor would be changing bodies easily like Romana did, and that was just STUPID!
Although the story always continues, The Doctor must fear the regeneration process as not only has he become attached to the personality he is currently but he never knows if he's going to come out of it the other side as the overall person he sees himself as
Perhaps his experiences as The War Doctor (or potentially even six) have made this fear worse, he fears the next incarnation might be the one to take things too far, to do things unbecoming of his name as The Doctor.

Though saying that, Matt's spoken word rap thing about breath on a mirror and being the person you need to be and all that crap came off worse, if RTD took it too far in the emotional stakes Moffat pushed it far too far in the cringe direction.

Well, Eleven said that you need to remember who you were, and I thought it was beautifully done. Still, different strokes....

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I like the sentiment but Matt decided to deliver it as a half rap, half Pam Ayres knowing wink oh I'm so clever spoken word poem.

Saying it in a 9 style and it could be up there with the best regens...but dancing around with it just ruined it
(minor thing but I hate the sound effect they gave when he took the Bow Tie off...
Bow Tie's are made of metal? )

I didn't mind it up until the line "I don't want to go". Now to me, the word "go" makes it seem that The Doctor is replaced by someone else rather than regenerate and carry on as the same person. Fair enough if RTD wanted to get the point across that The Doctor likes his Tenth self, I get that. But replacing the line with "I don't want to change" would have been more appropriate.

Regeneration is a daunting thing. You're going to completely change and not know who you're going to be on the other side. That's why I wouldn't mind the final line if it was said differently. But "I don't want to go"?? You're not going anywhere Doctor in 10 seconds time you'll still be here.

I'd go as far to say that it didn't help people accept Matt Smith as well because we felt that Ten had been replaced by Eleven, therefore making Ten look a victim in some ways.

As Ten's farewell tour was dragged out I think a lot of people's reaction was, 'we know you're going to regenerate, for goodness sake get on with it'.

It did go on for a bit too long; twenty minutes from the radiation booth to actual regeneration was too much in my opinion. I can understand not feeling so good about regeneration, Four did it well, but with Ten it came off as self-pitying. I can understand wanting to look back on the companions of that Doctor's era, Four, Five and Eleven did this well, but taking a whole ten minutes to have these huge farewells to characters we only saw a few episodes ago was just too much.

This leads to one of my biggest problems; there is no real sense of closure for the Tenth Doctor. Ten's character arc was about loss and sorrow, but in the end in just constantly loops back in on itself. Those feelings don't destroy him in the end, like Eight, but he doesn't get past them either, he just turns into Eleven, which basically turns into a hard reset for the series. He just ends up wallowing in self-pity, he neither gets worse or better and that always rubbed me the wrong way, it always made me think that RTD was basically saying "you can stop watching Doctor Who now, the only good Doctor is gone now."

I would have liked it if he learned to accept what had happened to him. I always thought that instead of going on about how he "could do so much more", if he ended up laughing bitterly at the irony of the situation; despite everything with the Master, Rassilon and the Time War, it all comes down to saving the life of an old man. He accepts it in the end of course, because if he can save the whole universe why not one more life? He's the Doctor, and the Doctor does what he can for his friends. Just wish it hadn't been radiation poisoning, already done that, might end up the laughing stock of the universe if it gets out he was killed by radiation twice.

The companion segment would be much shorter with the Doctor only thinking about his companions, an his last moments would be him learning that you can't let the awful things of your past hold you down, and that sometimes you need to just let go.

...I'm honestly disappointed that Ten never did learn that lesson.